HOW TO HELP: Volunteers sought to help remove flags from Boston Common this afternoon

Tuesday

May 30, 2017 at 8:21 AMMay 30, 2017 at 8:36 AM

Memorial Day flag “retiring” delayed by weather; help sought in lunchtime removal Tuesday

BOSTON – With steady rains predicted tonight, the dismantling of the Massachusetts Military Heroes Fund flag garden on Boston Common will be delayed until tomorrow, prompting organizers to ask for the public’s help in pulling the 37,251 flags over their lunch hour.

The flag display was scheduled to be dismantled tonight at 6 p.m. but doing so in the predicted rains would be difficult and force organizers to pack away the 37,251 flags wet – likely ruining many of them. Organizers, working with the City of Boston, opted to delay the flag removal until 12:30 p.m. Tuesday but now need dozens of volunteers to help.

“Last Wednesday, a volunteer army of 600 volunteers spent three hours planting these flags – tomorrow we only need a fraction of that and we can do our work retiring the flag garden within an hour or so,” said Diane Nealon, executive director of the Massachusetts Military Heroes Fund.

Volunteers are asked to meet at the display on the Common, immediately adjacent to the Soldiers and Sailors Monument near Charles and Beacon Street, at 12:30 p.m. Tuesday.

“If enough people help, we can do it in an hour but any amount of time the public can give would be amazing,” Nealon said. “We had 40 volunteers signed up to help tonight but we have to start from scratch for tomorrow since many of our folks can’t be there.”

Thousands flocked to the Common this weekend to view and support the flag garden, which features 37,251 flags symbolizing each of Massachusetts’ fallen heroes from the Revolutionary War to present day. Governor Baker and Mayor Walsh led an event Thursday where the names of 280 military service personnel were read as family members planted the final flags in the display.